Reset
by htd
Summary: Byakuran succeeds in stealing the Tri-ni-set. Vongola is in shambles. Tsuna's trapped in the heart of it all, searching for a way to fix everything, but he quickly discovers that fixing the future is a lot more complicated than breaking it. 10027, 6927.


Summary: AU!TYL arc. Byakuran succeeds in stealing the Tri-ni-set for himself. Vongola is left in shambles, and Tsuna finds himself trapped in the heart of it all, biding his time until he finds a way to fix everything. But as time passes, he discovers that fixing the future is a lot more complicated than breaking it was. 10027, eventual 6927.

**Warnings:** In this chapter, instances of dub-con, implications of non-con, graphic violence.

AN: Oh, I don't even know how this came to be. Each chapter will move between the pov's of Byakuran, Tsuna, and Mukuro. This chapter is Byakuran, so prepare for a less-than-sane point of view. Tsuna is up next.

* * *

Everything was _so boring_. Uni used to tell him that once he got everything he wanted, he wouldn't have anything left. Byakuran had ignored her then, but apparently—and here's the real kicker—apparently she'd been _right_.

What were the odds?

"It's not like the world was boring before," he explained. The bag of marshmallows laid abandoned, half-full, on the table. Tsunayoshi wouldn't look at him. "It was fun! Everything was fun. There were possibilities, endless ones, and that made the game worthwhile."

"Life's not a game." Tsunayoshi's voice was raspy and hollow.

"It is," Byakuran insisted. "It is because I say so." And that was that. He was god now—God, rather—and if he said things were a certain way, then they damn well would be.

Ever since he'd set Tsunayoshi on the sofa, the boy hadn't moved. He just laid prone, a pitiful look on his face. Byakuran figured he'd look more brooding and emotional if he had clothes on, though. As it was, Tsunayoshi was naked as the day as he was born, the backs of his thighs wet. He was probably making a mess on the couch.

"I don't understand you at all," Tsunayoshi said.

"No one ever said you had to," Byakuran replied.

After that, things were quiet for a while.

* * *

The world belonged to him.

The game was such a long and difficult one that Byakuran often marveled over the fact that he'd won at all. Vongola certainly had come close to snatching the prize right from under his nose, but at the last moment, he'd taken it all back: the Vongola rings, the Mare rings, the Arcobaleno pacifiers—and, as a bonus, Sawada Tsunayoshi himself.

He spent most of his days experimenting with the Tri-ni-set, slowly unraveling the puzzling abilities it gave him. Tsunayoshi would sometimes sit at his feet, an ankle chained to the desk, or maybe Byakuran would just let him lay on the floor if he was being particularly well-behaved that day.

It was perfect. It was all so perfect Byakuran wanted to destroy a bit of it just to have something to do.

He'd never imagined it would all be so boring.

"Tsunayoshi-kun?"

The boy remained on the floor, unmoving and silent. Byakuran pouted, spinning his chair to face him.

"_Tsunayoshi-kun_," he repeated, louder, and received a grumble and a stirring movement for his trouble. "Wake up," he sing-songed.

"Please," Tsunayoshi said, rolling onto his side and tucking his knees up to his chest. "I'm so tired, please just—"

"You whine too much," Byakuran said plainly. He got off the chair and onto the floor for a change of pace, grabbing the boy's leg and dragging him closer, unfolding him. Tsunayoshi didn't exactly resist, but he didn't make it easy. Weak hands grabbed at Byakuran's arms, a pleading whine that barely hit above the pitch of a whisper saying, _stop, I'm so tired, please_.

"You said," Byakuran got him on his back and grabbed the backs of his thighs, pressing him wide open, "that you'd do whatever I wanted, right? You gave me your word, Tsunayoshi-kun. If you don't do that—"

Tsunayoshi's eyes went wide, and then his body relaxed. "Sorry," he said. "I'm sorry. I won't do it again." He didn't sound too much like he meant it, but since things were more interesting like that, Byakuran pretended not to notice.

It was more fun to fuck with him than to fuck him. Byakuran rubbed a finger in the cleft of his ass, pressing inside Tsunayoshi, but his eyes were focused on the boy's face. Tsunayoshi would always let out this tiny sound, caught somewhere between a gasp and a pained whimper. He'd turn his face away and squint his eyes. Byakuran could read the _I just need to bear it for now_ on every pained line in his forehead and at the creases from his clenched eyes.

"How's this?" he asked, crooking his finger inside Tsunayoshi. He didn't get a response immediately, so Byakuran slipped two more fingers in and shoved them knuckle-deep. _That_ got a response.

"_Toosoon_," Tsunayoshi blurted, the words running together in his sudden panic. "Don't—_don't_—"

Byakuran liked the look on face: panicked, helpless, desperate. That was worth seeing, more than anything else. The end of the world was nice, but the pleasant buzz of it wore off pretty quickly. This, though, he could waste a while on—Tsunayoshi was such a fascinating human being.

Yeah, he could waste some time with this.

"You need to ask nicely," he said, smiling down at Tsunayoshi's despair. He pulled out his fingers and settled on grabbing Tsunayoshi's legs behind the knees and spreading him as wide as he could go. It made the boy nervous when Byakuran would go quiet and just stare down at him, completely exposed.

Tsunayoshi panted, his hands twitching downward, but they settled over his stomach. He knew better than to cover himself.

"Please let me go."

"That's not nice enough." They both knew it didn't matter how Tsunayoshi phrased it. Byakuran was just playing with him and would continue to do so until he was either satisfied or bored. "I'm tired of holding you. Hold yourself so my hands are free."

A shudder racked the boy's body, but he did as he was told. Tsunayoshi's helpfulness enabled Byakuran to tug his cock out of his trousers. He wasn't hard, but that was fixed easily enough. Leaning over Tsunayoshi, he planted a hand next to the boy's shoulder and spat on the other before lowering it to stroke himself.

"Say something," Byakuran instructed.

Tsunayoshi stared up at him with something akin to horror, his knuckles white and his hands clenched tightly enough at the backs of his thighs that they were sure to bruise. "What should I say? I don't know what to say!"

That delightful note of panic in his voice was enough. If he sounded like that, he could have been reading one of Kikyo's reports on current world affairs for all Byakuran cared. It still would have gotten him off.

"Just keep talking," he said, stroking himself a little harder, a little faster. "I don't care what you say, just don't stop talking."

"I'm sorry," Tsunayoshi was starting to cry by then, water welling up at the corners of his eyes, "I don't know what to say, so I'm sorry—"

"You said you'd do whatever I told you to do." Byakuran's voice came a little breathier as his cock responded.

"I will—"

"That's good," a little more, a little harder. Tsunayoshi was nearly perfect in his distress. "If you mess up, it'll be your friends who pay, ne? Mukuro-kun might be the only one I have as a guest _now_," nearly there, oh fuck, look at him, "but—you know," he was panting through the words, "your friends are only alive in this world because I _allow it_—"

Byakuran came all over Tsunayoshi's chest. It was the face he made at the mention of the ragtag Vongola that did it—he'd do anything to keep them safe. Byakuran just had to say one thing, one tiny insinuation even, and those big eyes would grow even rounder, would well up with tears and anxiety, and his teeth would suck in his bottom lip and roll it back and forth, nearly hard enough to break the skin. It was perfect.

Tsunayoshi was never boring.

* * *

"The Vongola have retreated for now, Lord Byakuran. We lost the trail after they fled to Germany. Permission to pursue?"

Kikyo looked exhausted. His face was pale and gaunt, and from the dullness of his appearance, Byakuran deduced that the squad had lost their stable food source a few days previous.

"No," he said. "It's fine. Let them lick their wounds for now. You can return to the base." It didn't really matter where they were. Byakuran just liked making them run, was all.

"My Lord." Kikyo saluted, obviously relieved, and Byakuran ended the video call.

He'd been in the middle of something important when Kikyo's call came through. He didn't want to be disturbed, but he had obligations to attend to outside of his personal interests.

The Tri-ni-set had shown him a new ability. An accidental one. Byakuran hadn't gone out of his way to test its healing capabilities, but even so, all it had taken was, of all things, a paper cut. The Tri-ni-set reacted to its master's injury immediately. Byakuran barely had time to feel the sting before the cut was gone.

Intriguing.

How extensive were the healing properties? Could he apply them to another human being? Byakuran wasn't about to mutilate himself just to test it, but there were scores of prisoners that had to be dealt with.

Briefly, he considered Mukuro, but then he'd have to deal with Tsunayoshi's whining. He preferred the boy's current state of compliance. No sense in compromising that.

Ah, but he could make a game of it, couldn't he? Byakuran spun in circles in his office chair, the smile on his face growing. It would be fun. It would be so damn fun he wouldn't even know how to handle it.

Clicking the com system on, Byakuran ordered a prisoner to be brought out of isolation.

Tsunayoshi was asleep on the bed still. He slept most days, so long as no one disturbed him. Byakuran didn't much like it. It was boring when Tsunayoshi ignored him, boring when Tsunayoshi slept the day away, boring when the boy wasn't sitting at his feet and crying.

"Tsunayoshi-kun…" Byakuran sat on the edge of the bed and nudged the boy's side. Tsunayoshi curled away from his touch instinctively. "Time to wake up," he said, louder this time.

He woke in stages: the twitching of his eyes, the unfurling of his body, and finally a cat-like stretching. Byakuran slipped a hand under the sheet and prodded him in the side, fingers skating over the boy's ribs. Tsunayoshi jerked and tried to roll away, but he got knotted in the sheets and wound up rolling off the side of the bed instead, crashing onto the floor with a heavy, painful _thud_.

Byakuran edged over to the other side and looked down. "Why did you do that?"

Tsunayoshi didn't even frown. "I didn't mean to," was all he said, sitting up and wrapping himself in the sheet. "I'm getting up." His voice was carefully blank, as though he'd been practicing how to sound like he was saying nothing at all.

"Hurry up, then. We have something exciting to do today." Byakuran was sure he looked excited himself, so the sudden darkening of the boy's expression didn't make a great deal of sense.

"I want to get dressed." His face was stormy. Byakuran watched him over the edge of the bed for a moment before shrugging.

"Do what you want. I never said you couldn't wear clothes! I thought you just liked being like that."

Tsunayoshi's head whipped around so fast it looked painful. He scrambled off the floor and slammed his hands down on the mattress. Byakuran bounced up and down, blinking at the irate boy. "You—you should have said so!" His voice shook. "You _made_ me—"

"Don't blame me for assumptions _you_ made, Tsunayoshi-kun." Byakuran got off the bed, straightening his uniform jacket. "Your clothes are in the armoire, where they've been since the day you arrived."

Tsunayoshi looked stricken. Holding the sheet around his body, he walked quickly to the large white armoire.

"Third drawer," Byakuran offered, and laughed when the boy muttered a resent-filled _thanks_. He really was much better like this.

* * *

The prisoner was arranged in Byakuran's third office—third because the compound was very large and sometimes he didn't feel like walking so far to get to any of the others—on the ground. Someone had moved the round conference table out of the room and brought in an extra chair for Tsunayoshi. The prisoner himself was on his knees, his hands secured behind his back, and a gag in place to keep him from making any unnecessary and unpleasant noise.

"Tsunayoshi-kun, meet our guest." Byakuran gestured to the bound man. Tsunayoshi's face drained of color.

"Why is he here?" The boy's voice trembled. With his clothes on, he looked even younger than his fifteen years. The jumpsuit was baggy and worn-looking, clearly having belonged to some senior official back in the Japanese base. Tsunayoshi was positively drowning in it.

"It's an experiment," Byakuran explained. "You can just watch, though. I don't really need you."

"What kind of experiment?" Despite the tremor in his voice, he sounded strangely resolute.

The prisoner glowered at them both, accusing and somehow resigned.

"When you were chasing after the Tri-ni-set," and here, Tsunayoshi's resolve faltered, dwindling to something small and pained, "did you ever wonder what it could do?" Byakuran patted his jacket and pulled out the retractable blade he'd stored in the inside pocket. "Well, did you?"

"No." Tsunayoshi sounded nervous. He licked his lips and continued speaking: "I wasn't looking to have it for myself, so I never thought about it."

"Pity," Byakuran said. Then he flicked the blade from the marble handle and whirled around, holding the sharp edge pointed directly between the prisoner's eyes. "And you?" he asked. "When you were planning to kill me and steal it for yourself, did you wonder?"

The prisoner's eyes went round, panicked. He began to struggle against his bonds, a garbled, muffled sound filtering out around the gag. Byakuran remembered for a moment that he didn't actually know who this prisoner was or what he'd done to warrant such treatment, but he figured it didn't matter. The game wouldn't suffer from a bit of added dramatics.

"What are you going to do?" Tsunayoshi asked, his voice tight. He stood just inside the doorway, frozen in the place where he'd first noticed the bound man. His fists were balled at his sides and his small reedy shoulders shook with restrained fury and helplessness.

"I prefer to show, not tell," Byakuran said, and very calmly slid the knife into the prisoner's right eye.

It was a spectacle. All at once, the man jerked and then went still, his muscles still tense and twitching. Tsunayoshi let out a startled cry and dropped to his knees, one hand flying to cover his mouth. He didn't close his eyes against the sight, which Byakuran found interesting. He'd always assumed the boy was the type to shy away from death, but again, Tsunayoshi proved him wrong. He didn't give Byakuran the wailing despair he'd looked forward to, but that frozen look of terror, the resigned posture—it was good enough. More than good enough, really, and if Byakuran hadn't been so busy twisting the knife in a circle and listening to the blade squelch and scrape against bone, he might have been tempted to leave the prisoner's body alone and take his time with the boy instead.

But he wasn't, and he didn't.

"As I was saying," Byakuran continued, sliding the knife wetly from the prisoner's socket. With nothing to hold it up, the body dropped to the ground with a hollow sound, dead weight. "The Tri-ni-set holds astounding power, far more than I'd ever anticipated!" Warming to the topic, he began emphasizing his words with grand gestures, slinging the knife around as he did. A splatter of something—surely nothing pleasant—painted a stripe across Tsunayoshi's face when Byakuran stepped a touch too close with the knife in his enthusiasm.

"My apologies, Tsunayoshi-kun," he interrupted himself and tossed the knife aside, stepping in close to wipe the grime from the boy's face with the sleeve of his uniform jacket. "In any case, I recently discovered a new possibility—something beyond the simple trick of increasing my own power. It was completely by accident, too! Can you imagine?" He laughed.

Tsunayoshi did not.

Frowning at the lack of participation on his audience's part, Byakuran nevertheless carried on. "I really do feel like God now," he finished.

"That doesn't make any sense." Tsunayoshi's voice was dull, his eyes trained on the corpse. "Nothing you say makes any sense."

"As I said—I prefer to show." He allowed himself a short bout of laughter which he assumed to sound intelligent and charming before returning to the corpse's side. He wasn't sure it would work. It was an experiment, after all, but if it _did_ work—oh, the things he could do.

'_I __**am**__ God_,' he reminded himself as he rested his hand on the dead man's face—and let the power rush out of him. It felt like turning a faucet on, only without the ability to stop and adjust the flow. It was either on or off, and the moment Byakuran lit the flame on his ring, the faucet poured power, unceasing. Even as he felt the drain of it tease the edges of his being, Byakuran could see the changes in the dead man's body.

Namely the fact that he was no longer dead.

It happened slowly. The man jerked, taking an audible, gasping first breath. Then the meaty mess dangling from his eye socket slowly began to wind inwards, the eye reshaping and the wound healing. It was as the eye was partially formed that Byakuran decided enough was enough and abruptly stopped the flow of power.

The healing process ended, the man began shrieking around the gag, writhing in agony as the pain of his partially formed eye and the half-healed wound set beneath it began to take hold of his awareness.

Byakuran was panting. He hadn't intended to use that much power. Really, he hadn't expected so much would be necessary. Was there another way to do it? A better way? Perhaps he was meant to concentrate the flow specifically in one area? He turned the thought over in his mind, searching for an answer, but his focus was cracked in half by the sound of Tsunayoshi retching.

That was that, then. He'd deal with the rest another day.

* * *

It was a matter of putting theory to practice, and over the following weeks, Byakuran did just that. Precision was necessary, lest he exhaust himself, and it wasn't always successful. He beheaded a man and attempted to revive him, only to overdo the output of energy. The man, when all was said and done, was no longer a man. He was a monster, three different partially formed heads sprouting from his neck, all in varying stages of completion, the result of an out of control outpouring of power. It only happened the once, though. Byakuran was a genius. He only made mistakes _once_.

Tsunayoshi never mentioned the first prisoner, and Byakuran didn't bring him along for the subsequent experiments. He decided it was important to perfect the art before putting it on display for such a delicate audience.

That, and it was simply never pleasant to watch the boy vomit. Byakuran had had quite enough of that.

The Tri-ni-set breathed life into the drab existence that followed the end of the original game. Byakuran had a new game now, a puzzle that presented endless questions, and if he had his way, he would have an eternity to spend solving them.

"You haven't been sleeping much." Tsunayoshi stirred the pasta around on the plate, his face pale.

"Worried?" Byakuran smiled at him across the table.

_No_, Tsunayoshi's face very clearly said. _I'm hoping you drop dead_. "It's just weird," is what he voiced, though.

Boring.

"There was too much to do," Byakuran explained. "I was too close to stop."

"You sound insane," Tsunayoshi muttered, "and you look it, too."

Byakuran didn't agree, but it was nice to hear some spirit in Tsunayoshi's voice for once. He'd have to keep it there.

They were out in the veranda outside of Byakuran's personal wing in the base. It was a pleasant enough place, if one didn't pay much mind to the guards lining the outer wall, and Byakuran was infinitely fond of it. That Tsunayoshi seemed livelier when they were there was another perk.

It wasn't the time for food. There was something he desperately wanted to show Tsunayoshi, and Byakuran knew exactly how to do it—and exactly how to get the best response.

"Let's go inside," he said as he loosened his shirt.

Tsunayoshi went a sickly white but scooted his chair back and stood anyway, steeling his expression like a soldier marching into battle. "Fine."

This was normal. His hands on Tsunayoshi, the way the boy refused to acknowledge anything, even with his knees on the bed and his ass in the air. He was good for it now, at least. Byakuran didn't have to tell him what to do or how to move. He didn't have to mention how he was tracking the Vongola throughout Europe or that Mukuro was still being held by the Millefiore. No, now Tsunayoshi would strip silently, would brace himself on the bed, his face pointedly fixed on the headboard, and he would do everything he could to keep his mouth closed and silent.

And Byakuran, as he ever did, tried his damndest to break Tsunayoshi's silence, his rebellious streak.

Even moving behind Tsunayoshi, sliding wetly in and out, one hand braced on his lower back and his hip as an anchor, the boy made no noise. It was as if to him Byakuran didn't exist.

"I wanted to show you." Byakuran's voice was punctuated with labored breathing, sounding every bit as indecent as the view Tsunayoshi gave him. "What I've been doing."

_That_ got Tsunayoshi's attention. He turned his head, giving Byakuran the view of a sliver of his face beyond his shoulder, the sharp angle of his nose and the tight set of his jaw. "And what," he broke off, clenching his teeth as Byakuran pulled his hips back hard. "_What_ did you want to show me?"

The fruit of his labor. The answer to the first puzzle. All these things and more. Byakuran wanted to show him the truth of the endless life Tsunayoshi would have within the walls of this stronghold. But, as ever, Byakuran didn't want to simply tell him. He wanted to _show_ him.

Everything was planned, right down to the last detail. Byakuran shifted behind Tsunayoshi, reaching out toward his jacket which lay discarded, hanging off the edge of the mattress. He pulled it closer and removed the standard-issue gun, a weapon made more or less useless by the introduction of the flame rings and boxes. He removed the safety and cocked back the trigger.

"I'll take care of everything," he promised, still steadily rocking his hips. Before Tsunayoshi had a chance to turn around and panic, Byakuran rested the barrel against the back of his head and pulled the trigger.

The noise was a bit of a turn off, as was the spray of blood and tissue all over his pristine white bed spread and down pillows, but he'd told himself before—it would be worth it.

Byakuran pulled out, still hard, and let Tsunayoshi's prone body drop face-down onto the bed. He swung his legs over the edge of the mattress and grabbed his cock, closing his eyes and jerking himself to the image of Tsunayoshi on his back, holding his legs open at the backs of his knees. When he came, it was in short spurts, and he felt no need to prevent it from dirtying the bed. Tsunayoshi had already seen to that.

Tsunayoshi had been dead for roughly a minute by then. As the experiments before had allowed, there was a fifteen minute time period in which he needed to revive the body. Else, he wouldn't be able to heal it properly. The tissue would start breaking down, and he wouldn't have the energy to do it all in one go. He didn't want to bed a decaying corpse, so the time limit was something to be minded.

So, fifteen minutes it was.

Byakuran grabbed the fluffy white robe from where it hung on the edge of the closet door and tugged it on, one hand reaching for the intercom button. "I want a drink," he said when the line crackled to life.

"What kind, sir?"

"Actually, make that two. Hmm… What do you think he'd like?"

A pause on the other end. "Who, sir?"

Byakuran laughed. "Tsunayoshi-kun, of course. He likes sweet things, doesn't he?"

"I'm sure he'd like whatever my Lord orders him." The attendant on the other end of the line sounded nervous.

"Then two of the usual," Byakuran said. "Have them here in five minutes." He released the com button and tied the robe securely around his waist. With that taken care of, he only needed to attend to the other steps. Lugging Tsunayoshi's body, for one. The boy was surprisingly heavy. Byakuran lifted him off the bed and brought him, naked and still bleeding, to the couch in the sitting room.

He was really beginning to rethink the all-white motif.

The shrill ringing that signified the arrival of an attendant sounded. The drinks had arrived, two large fruity beverages, rum and puréed fruit all poured in and made to look stylish. He'd taken a liking to them in America and hadn't stopped drinking them since. He imagined Tsunayoshi would enjoy the taste.

"Put them on the table," he said as the attendant walked in. The man did so, only pausing when he nearly dropped the drinks at the sight of the naked corpse on the couch adjacent to the table. "That will be all," Byakuran said loudly when the man went to question him. "I'm spending time alone with Tsunayoshi-kun. I'd hate it if you interrupted."

The man left without a word. His staff, Byakuran decided, was very well trained.

With that out of the way, Byakuran retrieved his phone and situated himself next to Tsunayoshi on the couch, wrapping his arm around the boy's thin shoulders. Holding the phone up, he grinned and raised two fingers.

The picture turned out perfectly. The only thing more perfect would be the look on Tsunayoshi's face when he saw it.

This part, however—this was what did him in. Byakuran rested a hand on both sides of Tsunayoshi's head, covering the entry and the exit wound. He opened the flow of power slowly, the necessary amount still something he had to determine consciously. As the power flowed from his hands in warm waves, he watched the body come to life once again.

Tsunayoshi sucked in a breath, tensing under his hands. His body shook. Pained gasps, barely audible, sounded from his lips.

When he was satisfied that Tsunayoshi was revived to exactly how he was before death, Byakuran stemmed the flow of power and rested Tsunayoshi against the arm of the couch.

"Welcome back," he said, grabbing his phone in one hand and his drink in the other. "I've set a celebration for us this evening in honor of my greatest success."

A sickly green shaded Tsunayoshi's face. He opened his mouth but no words came out. Then, finally: "What did you do?"

Byakuran clicked through his phone, humming happily. When he came to the appropriate picture, he held it up for the boy to see: "Isn't it something? With this, we'll never fear for death again."

It was just as he'd thought. As fun as taking the boy through a practical example was, nothing could best the despair so clear in Tsunayoshi's eyes when the realization came over him: there was no escape. Not even death.

Byakuran paid no mind to the retching sounds as Tsunayoshi slumped over the arm of the couch. The drink, he noticed, tasted particularly good that day.


End file.
